Almanac

Today is Saturday, Nov. 30, the 334th day of 2019. There are 31 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Nov. 30, 1782, the United States and Britain signed preliminary peace articles in Paris for ending the Revolutionary War; the Treaty of Paris was signed in Sept. 1783.

On this date:

In 1835, Samuel Langhorne Clemens — better known as Mark Twain — was born in Florida, Missouri.

In 1874, British statesman Sir Winston Churchill was born at Blenheim Palace.

In 1900, Irish writer Oscar Wilde died in Paris at age 46.

In 1936, London’s famed Crystal Palace, constructed for the Great Exhibition of 1851, was destroyed in a fire.

In 1960, the last DeSoto was built by Chrysler, which had decided to retire the brand after 32 years.

In 1965, “Unsafe at Any Speed” by Ralph Nader, a book highly critical of the U.S. auto industry, was first released in hardcover by Grossman Publishers.

In 1981, the United States and the Soviet Union opened negotiations in Geneva aimed at reducing nuclear weapons in Europe.

In 1982, the Michael Jackson album “Thriller” was released by Epic Records. The motion picture “Gandhi,” starring Ben Kingsley as the Indian nationalist leader, had its world premiere in New Delhi.

In 1988, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Co. was declared the winner of the corporate free-for-all to take over RJR Nabisco Inc. with a bid of $24.53 billion.

In 1993, President Bill Clinton signed the Brady Bill, which required a five-day waiting period for handgun purchases and background checks of prospective buyers.

In 2000, Al Gore’s lawyers battled for his political survival in the Florida and U.S. Supreme Courts; meanwhile, GOP lawmakers in Tallahassee moved to award the presidency to George W. Bush in case the courts did not by appointing their own slate of electors.

In 2013, Paul Walker, 40, the star of the “Fast & Furious” movie series, died with his friend, Roger W. Rodas, who was at the wheel of a Porsche sports car that crashed and burned north of Los Angeles.

Ten years ago: Retired Ohio auto worker John Demjanjuk (dem-YAHN’-yuk) went on trial in Munich, Germany, accused of helping to kill 27,900 Jews as a Nazi death camp guard. (Demjanjuk was convicted in May 2011 of being an accessory to murder; he was sentenced to five years in prison, but was released while his conviction was under appeal; he died in March 2012 at age 91.) In Geneva, the Large Hadron Collider, the world’s largest atom smasher, broke a world record for proton acceleration.